nilsssonof

Son of Schmilsson at 45 RPM – How Can It Possibly Sound This Bad?

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Harry Nilsson Available Now

Alternately titled: Forty Five, Schmorty Five.

Recently someone loaned us a copy of the Mobile Fidelity pressing of this album, the one they put out in 2021 on two discs cut at 45 RPM, remastered by that notorious hack, Krieg Wunderlich.

Our last shootout took place all the way back in 2021. Although I listen to this title regularly,  unfortunately it does not sell all that well, so we haven’t been making the effort we should to find copies in order to offer the best of them to our customers.

Why the album is not more popular is a question we ask about a number of titles on our site. We love the music and we love the sound, as can be seen from what we (with the help of Allmusic) had to say about a very good sounding pressing back then:

  • This is one of Nilsson’s best albums, sonically and musically. (With Ken Scott at the board at Trident Studios the sound just has to be good, doesn’t it?)
  • Son of Schmilsson has more than half a dozen of the best songs Nilsson ever wrote, and should make it a Must Own for every right thinking audiophile with sophisticated tastes in popular music (we hope this means you)
  • 4 1/2 stars: “… this is all married to a fantastic set of songs that illustrate what a skilled, versatile songsmith Nilsson was. No, it may not be the easiest album to warm to — and it’s just about the weirdest record to reach number 12 and go gold — but if you appreciate Nilsson’s musicality and weirdo humor, he never got any better.”

So true!

The MoFi, however, is a joke next to a properly-mastered and properly-pressed RCA vintage release. Our notes for it read:

  • Big but flat
  • Voice is recessed and lacks richness
  • Rock songs, track one in particular work OK but
  • Ballads lose all the magic

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Letter of the Week – “…it was like there was a blanket taken off the speakers.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Creedence Clearwater Revival Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom,   

Just some comments on the records purchased in July. Some of these records were a night and day experience for me. [For more tales of night and day experiences, we refer to them as “revelations,” please click here.]

I bought ten years after a space in time and nilsson son of shmilsson from the columbia record club back in the early seventies. I’ve taken good care of them and thought they sounded very good so I didn’t need to upgrade. You mentioned that we’ve never heard these records sound like this, so I thought I’d take a chance.

WOW! Space in time, son of schmillson, eat a peach, it was like there was a blanket taken off the speakers. Everything sounded sooo much better, more involving, the sound jumped out at me. And not that in-your-face shrill “run for the volume control” sound which was so prevalent in the late 80’s and into the 90’s. 

CCR cosmo’s factory, I’ve got an original mofi copy which sounded really good (I must have lucked out, 90% of the mofi’s I bought didn’t have a problem with sibilance. The ones that did have that problem and the dead as a doorknob presentation — anadisc 200 — are all gone.)

The super hot stamper of Cosmos factory on side 1 completely smoked the mofi, side 2 they were comparable. The super hot stamper had more depth to it. You could hear into the recording, making the experience more lifelike.

Thanks, Shane

Shane,

Thanks for writing. We love to hear from our satisfied customers!

Comparing the sound of the pressings you owned — including audiophile LPs in this case — versus the Hot Stamper pressings we sent you will allow you to recognize some fairly consistent differences. We’ve listed them below for handy reference and further study.

We hope these links will help you avoid other records with these same problems. As a general rule, the average pressing — of any kind — will fall short in some or all of the following areas when played head to head against the Hot Stamper pressings we offer:

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Harry Nilsson – Son of Schmilsson

More of the Music of Harry Nilsson

  • With two nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sides, this copy of Nilsson’s second-in-a-row Masterpiece of Bent Rock is close to the BEST we have ever heard, right up there with our Shootout Winner
  • This is one of Nilsson’s best albums, sonically and musically. (With Ken Scott at the board at Trident Studios the sound has to be good, doesn’t it?)
  • Son of Schmilsson has more than half a dozen of the best songs Nilsson ever wrote, and should make it a Must Own for every right thinking audiophile with sophisticated tastes in popular music (this means you)
  • 4 1/2 stars: “… this is all married to a fantastic set of songs that illustrate what a skilled, versatile songsmith Nilsson was. No, it may not be the easiest album to warm to — and it’s just about the weirdest record to reach number 12 and go gold — but if you appreciate Nilsson’s musicality and weirdo humor, he never got any better.”
  • This title from 1972 is clearly one of Nilsson’s best, and also one of his best sounding recordings
  • The complete list of titles from 1973 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

We had a great time shooting out a big stack of these, as we’re just wild about Harry here at Better Records. Unfortunately, most copies are too dark and grainy to get excited about.

Here’s a copy that tells a much different story —both sides have good energy, smooth and sweet vocals, and nice extension up top.

Drop the needle on Turn On Your Radio or The Lottery Song and we bet you fall in love with this one.

Ken Is The Man

It’s yet another triumph from one of our favorite engineers, KEN SCOTT (Ziggy Stardust, Magical Mystery Tour, Honky Chateau, Crime of the Century and many more).

This is one of Nilsson’s best albums, sonically and musically. Side one is amazingly good from start to finish. On the two CD set of Nilsson’s greatest hits (which is excellent, by the way) almost all of side one from this album is used, as well as the best material on side two, which includes Spaceman and The Most Beautiful World In The World.

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Another Harry Nilsson Must Own Album

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Harry Nilsson Available Now

(Which Makes Four for Those of You Keeping Score at Home)

It’s yet another triumph from one of our favorite engineers, KEN SCOTT (Ziggy Stardust, Magical Mystery Tour, Honky Chateau, Crime of the Century and many more).

This is one of Nilsson’s best albums, sonically and musically. (With Ken Scott at the board at Trident Studios the sound has to be good, doesn’t it?) Side one is amazingly good from start to finish. On the two CD set of Nilsson’s greatest hits (which is excellent, by the way) almost all of side one from this album is used, as well as the best material on side two here, which includes Spaceman and The Most Beautiful World In The World. In other words, this album has more than half a dozen of the best songs Nilsson ever wrote.

Nilsson Schmilsson and the album simply titled Harry are the other two superb Nilsson records that I highly recommend. Harry is my favorite of all his albums, maybe because it was so different from anything that I’d ever heard up to that point. A Little Touch of Schmilsson in the Night is also a personal favorite. It’s an album of standards done in the Nilsson style, and it’s wonderful in every way.

So those four are the ones to own. We guarantee you will love each and every one or your money back.

By the way, if the documentary Who Is Harry Nilsson (and Why Is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?) is on the box, you should definitely check it out. Most of us here have seen it by now and it’s a ton of fun. (more…)